Luncheon Features Jar Of Mud, Insults

TALLAHASSEE — In what has become the most rancorous Cabinet race to date, the Democratic candidates for attorney general came out swinging and slinging at a political club lunch here Friday.

``There are three difficult things in the world to do,`` Ormond Beach Sen. Edgar Dunn told the Capital City Tiger Bay Club in introducing his chief opponent. ``Kiss a girl when she`s leaning away from you, climb a barbed wire fence that`s leaning toward you and, the third is to say something good about Joe Gersten.``

That`s okay. Gersten, a South Miami senator, wasn`t to be outdone.

Gersten played a tape recording of an ad now being heard by radio listeners in Leon, Dade and Volusia Counties. In the ad he attacks Dunn, a 12-year legislative veteran and chairman of the Senate Judiciary-Civil Committee, for his behavior during a dispute over a traffic ticket in the small central Florida town of Orange City.

``Just when you thought it was safe to turn your radio on,`` intoned Gersten as an introduction. Then, the tape: ``What happens when a powerful politician bullies a young police officer doing his duty? The answer`s easy -- the politician throws his weight around, and the police officer loses.``

It was Gersten who had made sure the media would attend the luncheon gathering where issues took a back seat. Indeed, Gersten -- who serves as vice chairman of Dunn`s Senate committee -- billed the encounter as the second chapter in the true-life political drama, ``As the senator bullies.``

Walter Dartland, Dade County`s consumer advocate who is on a leave of absence for the campaign, wasn`t a target of the barbs. But he wasn`t about to be just an observer Friday.

``For Sen. Gersten I brought a portable jar of mud,`` Dartland said to loud applause. ``It`s Tallahassee mud. I fixed it this morning so I know it`s fresh and ready to use.``

Then Dartland gave Gersten a homemade sling -- to better aim the mud.

The Dunn-Gersten battle has been raging over how Dunn acted when he and a female friend were stopped by Orange City police because the woman`s car had an expired tag. Volusia State Attorney Stephen Boyles, Dunn`s friend and former boss, conducted an investigation into the incident and in early March determined that Dunn did not try to obstruct justice when arguing with the officers over the ticket.

But Gersten has harped on the July incident, releasing copies of police reports that show Dunn continued to argue with officers after being asked to get in the car and at one point Dunn yanked a pen from an officer`s hand.

Gersten`s campaign theme, however, drew little applause from the Panhandle audience. And Dunn drew loud laughter when he said, ``Joey Gersten is a rhetorical example of a blocked punt.``

And then there was lone Republican Jim Watt, a House member from Palm Beach County who reminded the audience he is nothing like former Interior Secretary James Watt.

``I`m the Jim Watt that still has some hair and likes the Beach Boys,`` he said while trying to avoid the Democratic swipes.

Watt wants to become the state`s first-ever elected Republican attorney general.